Peter Daou

About Peter

Peter’s journey has taken him from Beirut to the Beltway – from a war zone to an advisory role in the war rooms of two U.S. presidential campaigns. He has advised major political figures, including Hillary Clinton and John Kerry, and was described by the New York Times as “one of the most prominent political bloggers in the nation.” A consultant to the Clinton Global Initiative since its inception, he has organized media roundtables for President Bill Clinton and has crafted digital strategies for the UN Foundation, Department of Energy, Bloomberg Philanthropies, Intel, AARP, and Action Against Hunger, among others.

Peter grew up in Lebanon and lived through a decade of sectarian strife, undergoing compulsory military service in his teens. He moved to New York to attend NYU and has gone on to attain national recognition in three fields: as a blogger and activist, a political strategist, and, during the 90s, as a producer/engineer credited with several hit records. In 2014, he and his wife founded GrantHer to provide grants to the next generation of women entrepreneurs and leaders.

Background

Peter lived in Beirut during the Lebanese civil war and survived years of urban warfare, from artillery and gun battles to kidnappings and car bombs. He was steps away from the American embassy when it was demolished by a suicide bomber. At 15, he was conscripted into the Lebanese Forces – a Christian militia – and received combat training for three years. He moved to New York in the 80s to pursue his BA in Philosophy at NYU.

Music

During the 90s, Peter was a sought-after keyboardist, engineer and producer, appearing on recordings by Bjork, Miles Davis, Diana Ross and Mariah Carey, among many others. An accomplished jazz pianist, he was signed to Columbia/Sony and Universal, producing three #1 Billboard Club singles. He toured and performed with prominent DJs, including Moby, and was featured in Vibe, URB, Spin, Billboard and TIME.

Advocacy

Peter rose to prominence as a political blogger in the aftermath of the 2000 election. His widely-read essay, The Triangle, was described by techPresident as “a seminal essay on the interaction between the blogosphere, the political establishment, and the press.” He has been cited by news outlets from the AP to the Wall Street Journal and has spoken at venues including Harvard Business School and the National Press Club.

Advising

Peter was among the first Internet staffers to work in a presidential campaign war room, directing online outreach and rapid response for John Kerry’s 2004 campaign. For his work in the political blogosphere, the Washington Post said Peter had helped pioneer “a whole new way of campaigning.” In 2007, he was named Internet Director for Hillary Clinton for President and remained an adviser until 2009.

Writing

This is a follow up to my recent post, Pwning Hillary: Inside the Innerati’s Clinton Obsession My intention here is simple: detail the various narratives and frames (“calculating,” “secretive,” “polarizing,” etc.) that paint Hillary Clinton’s actions in the most negative possible light. These are carefully crafted and patently false scripts, many of which were concocted years […]

Hillary Clinton is indomitable. Famous. Funny. Fearless. The Euclidean center of political gravity. Because of who she is and what she is, because she is a woman in a world where women aren’t supposed to be Hillary Clinton, because she is the yardstick against which the innerati measure their own accomplishments, the slightest whiff of […]

A list of travesties: Worldwide, women and girls ages 15 to 44 are more likely to be maimed or killed by men than by malaria, cancer, war or traffic accidents combined. One in seven people on earth goes to bed hungry each night while 25 hedge fund managers made a combined $21 billion in a […]

The New York Times writes: Solitary confinement can be psychologically damaging for any inmate, but it is especially perverse when it is used to discipline children and teenagers. At juvenile detention centers and adult prisons and jails across the country, minors are locked in isolated cells for 22 hours or more a day. A recent […]

“No more hurting people” – Martin Richard, 8, killed in Boston Marathon attack. Violence: “The intentional use of physical force or power, threatened or actual, against oneself, another person, or against a group or community, that either results in or has a high likelihood of resulting in injury, death, psychological harm, maldevelopment, or deprivation.” The […]

UPDATE: “Hazardous Child Labor in US Tobacco Farming” “If current trends continue, tobacco will cause up to one billion deaths in the 21st century.” – CNN Tobacco companies sell deadly, addictive poison to the public. Consider these grim stats: Smoking remains America’s leading cause of disease and preventable death, resulting in more than 443,000 fatalities […]

At the age of seven, my nephew composed a 13-word rhyme as simple and powerful as anything I’ve ever heard: Soon it comes to every person, see it happen in one black curtain. Years later, I’m still mystified that a child could conjure such a cogent description of mortality. Perhaps that knowledge is programmed in […]

The greatest travesty of human life: One out of every three women will be a victim of violence in her lifetime. In some parts of the world a girl is more likely to be raped than to learn how to read. Murder is a leading cause of death for pregnant women. The children most at […]

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. – Martin Luther King, Jr. “Letter from Birmingham Jail” April 16, 1963 Those searing words are as apt today as they were a half […]

Patton Oswalt’s beautiful and heartfelt Facebook post understandably struck a chord with a nation stunned by the carnage in Boston: This is a giant planet and we’re lucky to live on it but there are prices and penalties incurred for the daily miracle of existence. One of them is, every once in awhile, the wiring […]